Sasanian navy

The Sasanian naval forces were established since the time of the empire's founder, Ardashir I. According to V. A. Dmitriev, the role of the navy was to advance the military, political, and commercial influence of the empire throughout the northern waters of the Indian Ocean. The navy was mostly active in the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea, and the Arabian Sea. The Sasanians downplayed the development of their navy due to their geopolitical interests as well as the fact that their military was highly influenced by the land-based military of the Parthian Empire, and that, unlike the Achaemenids, the Sasanians failed to capture the ports of the Eastern Mediterranean. ==Vessels==

The vessels used by the Sasanian military were exclusively transport landing ships for carrying land forces, and possibly also merchant ships for carrying cavalry. The dhow-type vessels were used in the Indian Ocean basin, while the Byzantine-style sailing-rowing dromons and chelandions were used in the Mediterranean, but only for transporting troops. The Persians were able to construct large ships suited for long voyages as far as the marginal seas of the north of the Indian and west of the Pacific Oceans. ==Operational history==

There were two distinct areas of operation for the Sasanian navy: the Indian Ocean basin (against the Arabs and the Ethiopians) and the Mediterranean (against the Byzantines). Later in that war, they were forced to rely on monoxyla of their allied Slavs in order to transport the 3,000 troops across the Bosphorus which they had promised the khagan of the Avars. The weakness of the Sasanian navy is considered a key factor in their failure to defeat the Byzantines in the last war between them. After the Muslim conquest of Persia, the Sasanian navy forces joined the Muslim armies and participated in the wars against the Byzantines and elsewhere. For example, according to the Chinese source Old Book of Tang, Guangzhou was ravaged and burned during the joint naval expedition of the Arabs and the Persians in 758. == References ==